Environment Minister Dr Harsh Vardhan on Tuesday inaugurated air pollution control device Wind Augmentation Purifying Unit, WAYU, at ITO in New Delhi. 

The device WAYU is developed by Council of Science and Industrial Research to mitigate air pollution at traffic junctions.

Along with particulate matter, the device will remove poisonous gases such as volatile organic compounds and carbon monoxide. 

This device works on two principles mainly wind generation for dilution of air pollutants and active pollutants removal. 

The Supreme Court today said that the legislators could not be banned from practising as lawyers in courts. A three-judge bench of the Supreme Court dismissed a petition seeking ban on the legal practice of MPs, MLAs and MLCs who are legal professionals.

The Supreme Court said that no law debars the MPs, MLAs and MLCs from practising in court. The petition had been filed by BJP leader Ashwini Upadhyay. He contended that allowing MPs, MLAs and MLCs to practise in a court of law amounts to violation of the fundamental right to equality before law as enshrined in Article 14 of the Constitution.

Though the number of lawyers being elected to the Lok Sabha has reduced since 1952 when the first Lok Sabha was elected. Back then, 36 per cent of the Lok Sabha MPs were lawyers. In the current 16th Lok Sabha, only 7 per cent members are lawyers. But they continue to dominate government and proceedings of Parliament.

The Supreme Court on Wednesday held that chargesheeted Members of Parliament and MLAs, on conviction for offences, will be immediately disqualified from holding membership of the House without being given three months’ time for appeal, as was the case before.

A Bench of Justices A.K. Patnaik and S.J. Mukhopadhaya struck down as unconstitutional Section 8 (4) of the Representation of the People Act that allows convicted lawmakers a three-month period for filing appeal to the higher court and to get a stay of the conviction and sentence. The Bench, however, made it clear that the ruling will be prospective and those who had already filed appeals in various High Courts or the Supreme Court against their convictions would be exempt from it.

Section 8 of the RP Act deals with disqualification on conviction for certain offences: A person convicted of any offence and sentenced to imprisonment for varying terms under Sections 8 (1) (2) and (3) shall be disqualified from the date of conviction and shall continue to be disqualified for a further period of six years since his release. But Section 8 (4) of the RP Act gives protection to MPs and MLAs as they can continue in office even after conviction if an appeal is filed within three months.

Instagram on Monday said co-founders Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger have resigned as chief executive officer and chief technical officer of the photo-sharing app owned by Facebook Inc, with the pair giving scant explanation.
The departures at Facebook's fastest-growing revenue generator come just months after the exit of Jan Koum, co-founder of Facebook-owned messaging app WhatsApp, leaving the social network without the developers behind two of its biggest services.

They also come at a time when Facebook's core platform is under fire for how it safeguards customer data, and while it defends against political efforts to spread false information.

Systrom wrote in a blog post on Monday that he and Krieger planned to take time off and explore "our curiosity and creativity again".

Their announcement came after increasingly frequent clashes with Facebook Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg over the direction of Instagram, Bloomberg reported.

In a statement, Zuckerberg described the two as "extraordinary product leaders".

"I've learned a lot working with them for the past six years and have really enjoyed it. I wish them all the best and I'm looking forward to seeing what they build next," Zuckerberg said.

Koum's departure in May led to a reshuffling of Facebook's executive ranks. Zuckerberg ally Chris Cox, who leads product development for Facebook's main app, gained oversight of WhatsApp and Instagram, which had been given independence when Facebook bought them.

NEW DELHI: India has 19 judges per 10 lakh people on an average, according to a Law Ministry data which also states that the judiciary faces a combined shortage of over 6,000 judges, including over 5,000 in the lower courts itself.

According to the data, part of a document prepared in March this year for discussion in Parliament, the judge-population ratio is 19.49 per million (10 lakh) people.

The document states that while the subordinate courts have a shortage of 5748 judicial officers, the 24 high courts face 406 vacancies.

The working strength of the lower judiciary is 16,726 while the approved strength is much higher at 22,474.

In the case of high courts, the approved strength is 1079, the actual strength is 6

Real Madrid’s Croatia midfielder Luka Modric was named Best FIFA Men’s Player of the Year for 2018 at an awards ceremony on Monday.

Modric won the Champions League with Real and then played a major role in Croatia’s run to the World Cup final where they were beaten by France.

Brazil’s Marta won the women’s award.

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A High-Level Committee of the Uttar Pradesh government has come out with recommendations aimed at providing solution to the completion of homes in the stalled projects of Noida, Greater Noida and Yamuna Expressway. The Committee was constituted by the State government vide order dated 18th June, 2018 under the chairpersonship of Secretary, Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA) in order to address the issues of home buyers and affected parties of Noida, Greater Noida and Yamuna Expressway. The mandate of the Committee was to identify the problems and to make clear recommendations to solve the issues raised by homebuyers. The committee held deliberations with all the stakeholders Home Buyers Association, Developers & their Association, Bankers, concerned administrative Authorities etc. before finalization its report.

It is being noticed that on various social media platforms the recommendations of the Report have not been clearly understood and it has been alleged that it favors the developers/builders.

In this regard, it is important to note that main problem of home buyers of Noida, Greater Noida and Yamuna Expressway is that of the ‘stalled projects’ and the only relief for home buyers is to ‘get these completed and give possession of their booked home’ as early as possible. Therefore, each recommendation has been made keeping the interest of home buyers only. The Committee has made a total of 10 recommendations.

Ø It is evident that the main reason of the stalled projects is the ‘lack of fund’ and ‘non-availability of last mile funding’, therefore the Committee’s first recommendation pertains to RBI for issuing guidelines to enable Banks to fund this gap. It will help home buyers to get their homes.

Ø Presently, nobody wants to put the m

No longer can it be considered a fluke or just a major stroke of luck. In Sunday's men's singles final of the China Open World Tour Super 1000 badminton championships, pint-sized Indonesian dynamo, Anthony Sinisuka Ginting, repeated his Asian Games triumph over Japan's recently crowned world champion, Kento Momota, to pocket the winner's cheque of $70,000 in the $1 million tournament.

The 21-year-old Indonesian's 63-minute 23-21, 21-19 triumph at the Olympic Sports Center in Changzhou over the Japanese left-hander, three years his senior, came on the back of a 21-18, 21-18 victory at the Asian Games, almost exactly a month ago.

Anthony Sinisuk Ginting of Indonesia reacts after beating Kento Momota of Japan in the men's singles final at the BWF China Open badminton tournament in Changzhou in eastern China's Jiangsu province, Sunday, Sept. 23, 2018. Sinisuk Genting beat Momota, 2-0. (Chinatopix via AP)Anthony Ginting reacts after beating Kento Momota in the final at the China Open. Chinatopix via AP
The prestigious China Open win brought their head-to-head tally to 3-4 against Ginting's name, and firmly reversed the trend of three losses in a row that the young Indonesian had suffered at Momota's hands at the Malaysian and Indonesian Opens earlier this year, and at the team event at the Asian Games.

The New Development Bank (NDB) of the BRICS countries has approved a $525-million loan to Madhya Pradesh for infrastructure projects, it said on Thursday.

The Board of Directors of the NDB on Wednesday approved a $350-million loan for the Major District Roads Project II of Madhya Pradesh and $175 million for building and upgrading 350 bridges.

The loan will be used by the Indian Government for on-lending to the Madhya Pradesh government for rehabilitating major district roads with a total length of about 2,000 km to improve the connectivity of the rural interior with the national and state highway networks, a press release issued by the Shanghai-based bank said.

The project will improve the road conditions and enhance the transport capacity, which will lead to a less travel time, reduced vehicle-operating cost, reduced emissions and improved road safety, it added.

KATHMANDU: While the number of tigers in many countries is witnessing a decline, a recent survey led by the Government of Nepal has shown that the population of tigers has almost doubled in under a decade in the country.

According to World Wildlife Fund (WWF), an organisation dealing with wildlife conservation and endangered species, this news can help Nepal become the first country to double its national tiger population since the ambitious TX2, a goal to double tiger numbers in the wild by 2022, was set in 2010.